Fall - School of Communication

Transcription

School of Communication at Northwestern
fall 2013
Calendar of events
National Theatre Live: The Habit of Art
December 10, 7 p.m.
Josephine Louis Theater
National Theatre Live: Hamlet
January 14, 7 p.m.
Aimee and Jaguar
by Lillian Groag
Based on the book by Erica Fischer
DIRECTED BY JOSEPH HANREDDY
January 31–February 9
Cabaret
Music by John Kander
Lyrics by Fred Ebb
Book by Joe Masteroff
Based on a play by John Van Druten
and stories by Christopher Isherwood
DIRECTED BY NICK BOWLING
In this issue
2
The future of communication and health
18
Faculty focus
22
Alumni achievements
28
Communicating gratitude
February 14–March 2
Ethel M. Barber Theater
Danceworks 2014: Hot Buttons
ARTISTIC DIRECTION BY SUSAN A. LEE
February 28–March 9
Moby Dick
Adapted and directed by David Catlin
Based on the novel by Herman Melville
Presented in collaboration
with Actors Gymnasium
April 25–May 4
For more information or tickets for
these and other school events, see
www.communication.northwestern.edu.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus (C83) stars in Enough
Said, which premiered at this year’s Toronto
International Film Festival. The film costars
James Gandolfini in one of his final screen
appearances. Louis-Dreyfus has had a great
year. She won her fourth Emmy Award as
outstanding lead actress in a comedy series
for Veep after receiving her 14th individual
Emmy nomination, surpassing Lucille Ball’s
longstanding record as the most nominated
comedic actress in Emmy history.
Message from th e dean
Throughout the School of Communication’s history, its faculty and alumni have made
significant contributions to improving health and healthcare. Faculty researchers in
the Roxelyn and Richard Pepper Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders,
for instance, have advanced knowledge of hearing, language, and learning and have
educated generations of doctors, nurses, speech therapists, audiologists, and healthcare administrators. Many faculty in the Departments of Communication Studies,
Performance Studies, and even Theatre and Radio/Television/Film have improved our
understanding of how individual health is shaped by communication and culture and
how healthcare systems can function more effectively. Until recently, however, we have
not made the study of global health and healthcare a school-wide priority.
In 2012 the University’s Strategic Plan prompted us to do just that. It marked out
10 critical areas in which Northwestern has the opportunity to advance knowledge dramatically
and, through its research and education programs, have a significant impact on the lives of people
around the world. Two of these, global health and biomedical science, are areas where we believe the
School of Communication can do a great deal more. And so we set out to pull together and enhance
the programs that have or could have a major global impact on health and healthcare.
We also see that School of Communication researchers have been quite effective at adding to the
larger conversation on health information, health disorders and interventions, and more. But they
have often achieved their greatest successes when working in large, collaborative teams that are interdisciplinary and interinstitutional. In a convergence of great thinkers with different approaches, the
sum, as the saying goes, is often greater than the individual parts.
In this issue of Dialogue, we introduce you to our own convergence of great thinkers in health
communication and explore how their collective efforts will shape the future of the school. We’ve
also highlighted the ways our faculty members are already influencing health behavior, policy,
institutions, and outcomes.
Few topics are as timely as this one. Health is a key to happy living, and finding ways to achieve
and maintain health (and pay for it) is a worldwide preoccupation. We still have much to learn about
the complex issues in global health, but we believe Northwestern and the School of Communication
are already well situated—in fact, uniquely situated—to have a far-reaching impact on how we protect
and care for ourselves, our families, and our communities for generations to come.
Barbara J. O’Keefe
Dean, School of Communication
Start a dialogue: [email protected]
The
future of
communication
and health
2
D i a l o g u e fall 2013
IN 2011
NORTHWESTERN
UNIVERSITY’S
STRATEGIC
PLAN SET FORTH
A PLATFORM OF
10 STRENGTHS
THAT WILL LIFT
THE UNIVERSITY
TO EVEN HIGHER
HEIGHTS.
THIS ISSUE
OF DIALOGUE
IS THE FOURTH
IN A SERIES
SHARING THE
WAYS OUR
SCHOOL OF
COMMUNICATION
COMMUNITY
CONTRIBUTES TO
NORTHWESTERN’S
FUTURE.
GLOBAL HEALTH
Our research in
global health involves
collaboration among
business, engineering,
education and social
policy, anthropology
and sociology, communications and journalism, and naturally
medicine. Our faculty
and students work
together on a global
scale on issues
ranging from HIV in
Africa to nutrition,
obesity, and diabetes
in the United States
to collaborative
ways to respond to
a natural disaster.
—Northwestern University’s
2011 Strategic Plan
fall 2013 D i a l o g u e
3
The Future of Communication and Health
Developing an agenda for communication and health
In April the School of Communication invited a group of health leaders from across the country to campus to
discuss the school’s new initiatives in health communication. The agenda for the two-day Lambert Family
Communication Conference was to identify an agenda for research and education for a new Center for Communication and Health (see page 7). The conference—”The Science and Practice of Health Communication:
Innovative Interfaces to Improve Health”—assembled experts to discuss issues and opportunities for communication and health and how Northwestern’s already substantial investments in the area could best advance
the field. Three participants in the conversation sum up the conference’s discussion.
ELLEN WARTELL A (above left) is the Sheikh Hamad bin
communication, drug name confusion, patient and medication
Khalifa Al-Thani Professor of Communication in the School
safety, health literacy, health information technology, prescrib-
of Communication’s Department of Communication Studies
ing behavior, pharmacoepidemiology, pharmaceutical promo-
as well as director of the Center on Media and Human
tion, medical liability reform, and health outcomes associated
Development. She researches the effects of media on
with provider-patient communication.
children and adolescents and the impact of food marketing
in the childhood obesity crisis.
WARTELL A
DANIEL O’KEEFE (above center) is the Owen L. Coon
Professor of Argumentation and Debate in the School of
Communication’s Department of Communication Studies.
His research focuses on organizing and synthesizing the
substantial body of work derived from persuasion studies—
the effects of messages on persuasion and the distinctive
problems associated with the development of dependable
I think this event was a tremendous achievement:
two days of highly concentrated expertise from a broad range
of health and healthcare organizations and backgrounds. The
attendees were of such a high caliber and were so engaged and
enthusiastic about the questions put before them: where they
saw opportunities for improvement in healthcare and health
communication, and how Northwestern could go about
answering those needs.
generalizations about persuasive message effects.
O’KEEFE
BRUCE L AMBERT (above right; no relation to the benefactors
of the Lambert Family Communication Conference) is a
professor in the School of Communication’s Department
of Communication Studies and director of the new Center
for Communication and Health. He researches health
The group had a lot of ideas about ways communication skills could be leveraged to improve patient care and
medical education and training—but it was all to the same
end. How can communication help keep people healthy?
There are issues of message development and dissemination
but also of patients adhering to medical advice, being able to
(continued on page 6 ³)
4
Lambert Conference attendees
Thomas Abrams (RPh,
MBA), Director, Office of
Prescription Drug Promotion,
Center for Drug Evaluation
and Research, Food and Drug
Administration
David W. Baker (MD,
MPH), Chief, Division of
Medicine–General Internal
Medicine and Geriatrics,
Michael A. Gertz Professor
of Medicine, Professor in
Medicine–General Internal
Medicine and Geriatrics and
Center for Healthcare Studies,
Feinberg School of Medicine,
Northwestern University
David Bates (MD, MSC),
Professor of Medicine,
Harvard Medical School;
Professor of Health Policy and
Management and Codirector,
Program in Clinical Effectiveness, Harvard School of Public
Health; Medical Director of
Clinical and Quality Analysis–
Information Systems, Partners
HealthCare System
Larry Boress, President and
CEO, Midwest Business Group
on Health
Dina L. G. Borzekowski
(EdD), Associate Professor,
Department of Health,
Behavior, and Society,
Bloomberg School of Public
Health, Johns Hopkins
University
David Cella (PhD), Professor
and Chair, Department of
Medical Social Sciences,
William L. Galanter (MD,
PhD), Medical Director, Center
for Education and Research
on Therapeutics and Clinical
Information Systems, College
of Medicine, University of
Illinois at Chicago
Sheldon Kong (PhD),
Executive Director, Health
Economics and Outcomes
Research, Novo Nordisk
Bruce Lambert (PhD),
Professor, Department of
Pharmacy Administration,
University of Illinois at
Chicago; Professor, Department of Communication
Studies, and Director,
Center for Communication
and Health, Northwestern
University
Donald M. Lloyd-Jones
(MD), Senior Associate
Dean for Clinical and
Translational Research
and Chair, Department
of Preventive Medicine,
Northwestern University;
Director, Northwestern
University Clinical and
Translational Sciences
Institute
Timothy B. McDonald (MD,
JD), Professor, Anesthesiology
and Pediatrics, College of
Medicine, University of
Illinois at Chicago; Chief
Safety and Risk Officer for
Health Affairs, University of
Illinois Hospital and Health
Sciences System
David C. Mohr (PhD),
Professor in Preventive
Medicine, Medical Social
Sciences, and Psychiatry
and Behavioral Sciences,
Barbara O’Keefe (PhD),
Dean and Annenberg
University Professor,
School of Communication,
Daniel O’Keefe (PhD),
Owen L. Coon Professor
of Argumentation and
Debate, Department of
Communication Studies,
Scott Ratzan (MD, MPA),
Vice President, Global Health,
Johnson & Johnson; Editor
in Chief, Journal of Health
Communication
Gwen Sherwood (PhD, RN),
Professor and Associate Dean
for Academic Affairs, School
of Nursing, University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Jean Slutsky (PA, MSPH),
Director, Center for Outcomes
and Evidence, Agency for
Healthcare Research and
Quality, US Department of
Health and Human Services
Bonnie Spring (PhD),
Professor in Preventive
Medicine, Psychiatry,
and Behavioral Sciences,
Christine Stencel, Senior
Media Relations Officer,
Institute of Medicine,
National Academies
Richard Street (PhD), Professor of Communication,
Texas A&M University;
Director, Health Communication and Decision-Making
Program, Houston Center
for Quality of Care, Baylor
College of Medicine
Ellen Wartella (PhD),
Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa
Al-Thani Professor of
Communication, Department
of Communication Studies,
Michael Wolf (PhD,
MPH), Associate Professor
of Medicine and Learning
Sciences and Associate
Division Chief–Research for
General Internal Medicine,
Northwestern University X
5
make decisions for themselves and their families, and being
able to find information they can understand and trust,
as well as problems of coordination and navigation. Some
of these issues are already research topics for our faculty,
but we also added a great many areas of inquiry to our
research agenda.
Lambert Conference speaker
Lambert Family Communication Conference
keynote speaker David Bates of Harvard University
discussed technology’s role in health quality and
communication. Bates thinks electronic records
can help make healthcare more “patient centered”
—more respectful of and responsive to individual
patient needs, preferences, and values.
Average healthcare visits are short and often
interrupted. Many patients leave with unanswered
questions. “There’s lots of data that says better
communication is associated with better outcomes,” said Bates.
Handheld devices can help in smoothing transitions between care providers, making sure care
plans are shared and adhered to, and ensuring that
referrals are made and appointments kept. They
can provide information at the exact moment doctors and patients need it, easing decision making.
But they can’t do everything.
“It is abundantly clear that when you computerize a process in healthcare, you have to do
it carefully,” he said. “You have to track and see
how you’re doing. When you find new problems,
you fix them. If not, some people can and will be
hurt. The stakes really are high. In the long run,
electronic tools should help patients communicate
much more effectively with providers, and that will
likely be one of their greatest benefits.” X
6
WARTELL A
They mentioned research topics like communication strategies and cognitive science in the same breath.
I think that’s why the School of Communication is the right
place for this kind of ambitious endeavor.
L AMBERT
The education agenda they set for us was
ambitious as well. They had a lot of specific ideas on how
to train the professionals they saw a place for in the healthcare industry, from communication theory and methods
to opportunities for actual clinical experience. The group’s
experience with other educational models assured us that
there are people out there who are hungry for this kind
of knowledge, as well as employers who are ready for this
kind of specialty—and that perhaps no other institution
is better suited to build a lead program.
O’KEEFE
We asked them why Northwestern should be
developing this program. The attendees from other corners
of Northwestern knew precisely why: Northwestern’s
scale, our partnerships with other institutions, our multidisciplinary nature, and the Northwestern network that
embraces alumni after they finish their degrees.
L AMBERT
In the end the attendees reaffirmed our belief
that there are tremendous research and educational opportunities in the area of health communication, as well as
funding opportunities that will allow us to implement this
program quickly—with the first class of students expected
in the fall of 2014—and, we hope, expand it into a premier
research enterprise making a vital contribution to improved
quality, safety, and efficiency of healthcare in this country
and beyond. X
New center addresses healthcare’s challenges
BRUCE L AMBERT likes big
enter one of today’s fastest-
person’s ability to read the
issues, concentrating on
problems. He’s chosen pos-
growing industries and
chicken-scratch handwriting
the design, production,
sibly the biggest of them all:
healthcare professionals
of another. We’ve heard the
analysis, and evaluation of
American healthcare. And
ready to solve some of their
horror stories: surgeries per-
messages, interfaces, inter-
while he’s as interested as
field’s lagging problems.
formed on the wrong side of
actions, media, audiences,
the body, surgical tools sewn
and networks—and on
up inside the patient.
research into social influence
anyone in our country’s cur-
Those problems? Safety.
rent debates over availability
Effectiveness. Timeliness.
and cost, what truly inter-
Efficiency. Inequity. And fail-
ests him is what happens
ing to center on the patient.
at the point of care—where
Each of those catego-
“The science of safety
and human-centered design.
has not progressed enough
In both those areas, Lambert
to keep all errors from hap-
sees the results quickly
debates are moot, and where
ries offers endless areas
pening,” said Lambert. “So
becoming useful on the
a lot of things can go wrong.
for improvement. Take the
we have to look at both the
ground. “It is our goal to be
issue of patient safety,
things that cause harm and
the premier health communi-
costly, and often of low qual-
one of Lambert’s topics of
also what happens after
cation program in the world,”
ity,” said Lambert. “Healthcare
interest. There are issues
harm is caused.”
said Lambert. “Healthcare is
is much more dangerous
of compliance, of error, of
than most people realize,
confusion. Drug names that
cation and Health will support
dysfunctional—but we think
until they get older and need
are too similar. A prescription
interdisciplinary, high-impact
we can have a huge impact
more interventions.”
system dependent on one
research into these and other
on its future.” X
“Healthcare is unsafe,
The Center for Communi-
so fragmented, complex, and
Lambert is one of the
School of Communication’s
newest faculty members
(see page 20), but he’s bringing a lifetime of research
and results to a new area of
inquiry for the school: health
communication. He’s the
director of the new Center
for Communication and
Health, a program that will
begin accepting master’slevel students within the
year; within a few years,
the one-year residential program may lead to a doctoral
program. Lambert predicts
the program’s students will
be a mix of communication
professionals looking to
7
Marshaling resources across campus and beyond
EARLIER THIS FALL
a team of researchers received notice
of a $2.5 million National Science Foundation grant to
fund their five-year project studying how children’s media
characters (like Elmo or Dora the Explorer) might help young
children develop skills in science, technology, engineering,
and math (STEM). The research subjects may be small—
the children in the study range in age from 18 months to
six years—but the potential impact is huge. How can children’s media help promote knowledge, and eventually career
choices, in these areas of vast economic opportunity and
societal need?
The research team is also large, consisting of scientists
at three universities across the country. They are led by
Ellen Wartella, Northwestern’s Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa
Al-Thani Professor of Communication and director of the
Center on Media and Human Development in the School of
Communication’s Department of Communication Studies;
principal investigator Rebekah Richert, associate professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside;
and Sandra Calvert, director of the Children’s Digital Media
Center and professor of psychology at Georgetown University.
“We believe that young children think of media characters they like as important social friends and that this
parasocial relationship can set the stage for utilizing such
characters to encourage young children’s learning about
science and math education,” said Wartella. “We hope to
stimulate interest in using media characters to promote
STEM education in the preschool and early elementary years.”
Wartella also serves on the steering committee for
Northwestern University Interdisciplinary Innovations in
Developmental Education and Science (NUIIDEAS). This new
University-wide initiative was designed to bring together
Northwestern’s rich and diverse community of scholars who
focus on early human development and its scientific, educational, health, and policy implications for lifespan trajectories. In October the group hosted a symposium on stress
measurement and intervention. “It’s an interesting approach
to organizing,” said Wartella, “so that researchers across the
Northwestern community can find collaborators and carry on
a dialogue on the issues we’re all working on.”
In addition to these efforts and her project on reproductive health issues in young cancer survivors (see page 10),
8
Wartella has garnered worldwide attention for
the research generated by her center that detailed
how many hours children of varying races spend
in front of visual media and how much—or how
little—parents think “screen time” is a problem.
Wartella is also highly involved in the School
of Communication’s new health communication
initiative (see page 4). “There’s a pretty restricted
view of what health communication can mean, and
then there’s our view,” said Wartella. “How can care
be more patient centered? How can we help develop
new kinds of healthcare workers? How can technologies like monitoring systems and sensors help
provide better care? At Northwestern we have people
working in all of these areas.”
In addition to Wartella, many other School of Communication
faculty members are in the forefront of assembling large-scale
collaborative research teams that bridge disciplines and academic
boundaries to address today’s large and complex research problems
in health science.
CYNTHIA THOMPSON: GATHERING EXPERTS
IN L ANGUAGE RECOVERY
In March, Cynthia Thompson, the Ralph and Jean Sundin Professor
of Communication Sciences in the School of Communication’s
Roxelyn and Richard Pepper Department of Communication
Sciences and Disorders, landed a $12 million grant from the
National Institutes of Health to study aphasia—a devastating
disorder, often linked to stroke, that robs the brain of language
abilities. The grant will help fund the new Center for the
Neurobiology of Language Recovery, which brings together
the top aphasia researchers at Northwestern, Johns Hopkins,
and Boston Universities. Thompson directs the center, which
has the potential to challenge existing clinical practices for
aphasia as well as promote treatment availability. “In the
United States alone, more than a million people suffer from
aphasia, rendering normal communication impossible,” said
Thompson. “For the first time, the best researchers in the
field will work together to find biomarkers that can predict
language recovery.”
Cynthia Thompson meeting
with members of her lab
and, by videoconferencing,
her collaborators in the new
Center for the Neurobiology
of Language Recovery
CHARLES L ARSON: TEAMING UP TO STUDY
THE VOICE AND WIELD RESEARCH
postdoctoral fellows to apply basic research skills toward
treating a variety of communication disorders.
INFRASTRUCTURE FOR SPEECH SCIENCE
Charles Larson, professor in the Pepper Department of Com-
KNOWLES HEARING CENTER:
munication Sciences and Disorders, studies the neural
mechanisms controlling the voice and the larynx—voice
production, voice control, and how brain disorders create communication disorders. Larson is at the helm of several large,
collaborative, cross-disciplinary projects. In a study funded by
the National Institutes of Health, Larson’s lab is using EEG and
fMRI techniques to model brain function that is related to control of the voice. His team experimentally induces unexpected
errors in subjects’ vocal production and then measures brain
activity as subjects try to correct the error. Larson and his colleagues are also looking at how the brain’s processing of voice
control differs in Parkinson’s disease patients, whose voices
are often low and monotonous; the eventual goal is to develop
improved treatments for voice control in these patients. In
another project, Larson tracks brain activity in young adults
with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. “Children with
ADHD don’t have abnormal voices, but they are impulsive,”
said Larson. “We’re hoping to establish a biomarker for impulsivity.” In addition to his research grant, Larson leads another
large federal training grant that funds PhD students and
SUPPORTING RESEARCH AND MENTORSHIP
Northwestern’s Hugh Knowles Center was established to
foster research, clinical training, and community service by
pulling together a pool of interdisciplinary researchers who
study hearing. In addition to funding faculty research, providing seed grants for pilot data, and granting scholarships
to audiology graduate students, the center fosters a dialogue
in the hearing research community. It hosts a seminar series
and an annual fall symposium (this year’s topic: “Noise in
Hearing”) and gives a prize for major contributors to the
understanding of hearing, hearing disorders, or clinical
approaches to audiology. “In the Knowles Center, we have
people who are actively engaged in research that supports
student education,” said director Beverly Wright. “We find that
faculty members who are active in the lab are better teachers in the classroom, and of course the students themselves
become engaged in research in the process.” (See page 28 for
more information about the Knowles family and its establishment of the Knowles Center.) X
9
Preparing for life after a childhood health crisis
A health concern for young people has
inspired a longstanding collaboration
between faculty members in the School
of Communication and the Feinberg
School of Medicine: hormonal and fertility issues for young cancer survivors.
Years ago, Theresa Woodruff, now the director of the Women’s Health Research
Institute and the Thomas J. Watkins
Memorial Professor of Obstetrics and
Gynecology, sought the assistance of
Over several years, Feinberg School
of Medicine faculty member Theresa
Woodruff has relied on a number of
School of Communication collaborators, including Dean Barbara O’Keefe,
to frame complex issues in oncofertility
for better communication with patients
and their families.
Barbara J. O’Keefe, dean of the School
of Communication. The problem?
Childhood cancer survivors were
glad to be alive but far too young to
understand the long-term effects on
their chances of conceiving later in
life. Their families didn’t understand
the implications, either. It was not an
issue anyone knew anything about.
“Barb really helped us position the
problem,” said Woodruff. “And now we
have the OncoFertility Consortium, and
it’s identified as a medical specialty.”
An ongoing problem, however, is
that few people understand the long
road young cancer patients face. Two
collaborations between Woodruff and
School of Communication faculty members continue to develop solutions.
HELPING FAMILIES TALK
Kathleen Galvin, professor of communica-
tion studies, was called on to develop
what she calls a “decision aid” for
10
families whose children face cancer—
and possible loss of fertility—at a young
age. “Boys, if they’re old enough, can
have their sperm banked,” said Galvin,
“but a fertility-saving procedure for girls
requires surgery. So a parent has to make
a decision very quickly about whether or
not to opt for that, which would put off
the cancer treatment.”
Author of the definitive Family
Communication: Cohesion and Change
(soon to appear in its ninth edition),
Galvin is an expert on modern families
—or what she has termed the “discoursedependent family.” These include stepfamilies, transracial adoptive families,
and families with gay or lesbian parents.
Her signature research has expanded
over the years to include how family
members in general communicate
about health.
For the fertility-saving study, she
spoke with parents of girls who had
been treated for pediatric cancer some
16 years prior and hadn’t had the option
of surgery. “We asked them how they
would’ve reacted,” she said. “What
would they want to know? What would
help them make their decision?” Galvin
and her colleagues took these answers
and created a clear and comprehensive
guide for parents navigating these new
and choppy waters.
School of Communication faculty
members Ellen Wartella and Eric Patrick
(seated) discuss their joint project in
reproductive health communication
for the OncoFertility Consortium with
lecturer Alexis Lauricella (center). The
three faculty members’ students in two
undergraduate radio/television/film and
communication studies courses have
also contributed to the project.
ILLUSTR ATING THE PROBLEM
It’s not just parents who need to
understand the situation. So Woodruff
called on Ellen Wartella, Sheikh Hamad
bin Khalifa Al-Thani Professor of
Communication in the Department
of Communication Studies, and Eric
Patrick, an associate professor in the
Department of Radio/Television/Film.
The two are developing a series of short
videos to teach children as young as
six or seven years old about their own
bodies and reproductive health.
No small order, Woodruff admitted.
“People put their hands up and say, ‘Just
don’t talk to me about that,’” she said.
“Because it’s tied to sexuality, they somehow think it’s dirty.”
There’s nothing dirty about the
excitable Olivia the Ovary (above left),
star of the prototype video developed
by Patrick and his students—including
Andrea Schmitz (C14), who designed
Olivia and her flippy fallopian-tube
ponytail. Patrick’s seven years as an
animator for the children’s show Blue’s
Clues has come in handy, making Olivia
(and her twin, Olga) childlike and not,
well, gross.
“What we’re working on is, can it
be fun as well as useful?” said Patrick.
“Quite frankly, can it not be creepy?
We’re talking to girls at the age where
there’s been very little research on kids’
conceptualization of their bodies, and
they’re also children, so we have to think
about the principles that help direct
their attention and help with retention
of information. It’s an interesting set
of problems.”
“We want people to understand
reproductive health more fully so that
they can make good decisions,” said
Wartella. “Our hope is that if we develop
good communication strategies, we’ll
help a much wider audience than the
kids and their families. We’ll help far
more people understand reproductive
health as part of their overall health.” X
Kathleen Galvin talks with
doctoral student Esther Liu.
11
Making healthy choices about philanthropy
Health is wealth, as the expression goes, and
for those whose health is in short supply,
life can get very expensive. The same applies
to health-related nonprofits. Whether it’s
a biggie like the American Cancer Society
or a lesser-known local like the Austin
Foundation for Eating Disorders, there is
always a need for what Blanche DuBois
famously called “the kindness of strangers.”
Communication studies associate
professor and National Science Foundation
CAREER Award winner Michelle Shumate
explores nonprofits and their relationships
with other companies and organizations.
While the scope of her research extends
to nonprofits of all kinds, she frequently
focuses on health.
In a recent study Shumate made some
fascinating findings about which nonprofits
receive the most philanthropic donations
from Fortune 500 companies. Health nonprofits scored high. “Women make about
80 percent of the purchasing decisions in
American families,” said Shumate, “so you
see issues that affect women—and children,
in particular—being given a lot of oomph
from these particular companies. St. Jude
Children’s Research Hospital is a great
example.”
But if your nonprofit deals with health
on the margins, you’re a lot less likely to
attract corporate support. “Elderly issues?
Things like dementia? They’re not well
12
represented at all,” said Shumate.
“The nonprofits I talk to are well
acquainted with this story. They’ll
joke, ‘Yeah, it’s really easy if your mission is cute puppies or cute kids.’”
As director of the Network for
Nonprofit and Social Impact, Shumate
ultimately hopes to take her work
“to a policy level”—in part, to help
nonprofits hovering on the margins.
“There’s a lot of talk today about
leaving philanthropy to the private
sector,” she explained, “but if we continue to scale government away from
these less recognized nonprofit issues,
nobody will be there to step up.” X
Checking up on Dr. Google
Like it or not, we’re living in an age when
“the majority of American adults have used
the Internet to get health information,” said
Eszter Hargittai, the April McClain-Delaney
and John Delaney Research Professor of
Communication Studies. This would have
been unthinkable 25 years ago, but now that
we find ourselves in this brave new world,
it’s important to learn more about how these
self-guided searches are conducted. After all,
said Hargittai, “when it comes to health-related questions, getting the
wrong answers could have some pretty serious consequences.”
Director of the School of Communication’s Web Use Project, Hargittai
is one of the nation’s leading experts on social media research. In one
of her recent studies, funded by Google, she and her colleagues asked
76 adults to sit down at a computer and answer nine different complex
health questions: You suddenly notice a red spot on your eyeball. You have no
idea what it is. How do you figure it out, and what is it? Or, your pregnant friend
decides to have a glass of wine. Should this be a concern? Why or why not?
The study’s findings were intriguing. Many participants acknowledged their reliance on user-generated content—sites like Wikipedia
and Yahoo Answers—with only a portion of them questioning the sites’
credibility. “Very few participants considered the date of the content,”
said Hargittai. “In health matters, you don’t necessarily want to be looking at something too old.”
The study supported earlier work suggesting that there is still a lot of
room for improvement when it comes to honing web-use skills. Hargittai
continues to be driven by this challenge. “One of the things my work
has shown is that people from more privileged backgrounds tend to have
an online advantage,” she said. “While changing people’s socioeconomic
status is a very complex matter, building their Internet skills could go a
long way toward leveling the playing field. And that’s my overall goal.” X
Illuminating autism
Autism, a complex neurological disorder
that seems to be on the rise (with a tenfold
increase in reported cases over the past 40
years), has baffled sufferers and scientists
alike. But for all its growing visibility, the
disorder—which affects behavior as well as
social and communication skills—remains
mysterious and hard to understand. “We
know there’s a strong genetic contribution,”
said Molly Losh, the Jane and Michael Hoffman
Associate Professor of Communication
Sciences and Disorders, “and there are environmental risks that probably interact with
the genes. But the disorder itself, the clinical
Building a better hearing test
A staggering number of older adults are turning deaf ears (if you’ll pardon
the expression) on their own hearing health. Almost 80 percent of people
in their 70s and 80s have significant hearing loss, but only a quarter of
them end up getting help. And those who do usually wait seven to ten
years after the onset of the problem—“a time when a lot of damage has
already happened,” said Sumitrajit Dhar (above, right), a Hugh Knowles fellow
and professor of communication sciences and disorders.
Those aren’t rosy numbers. And today’s hearing tests haven’t done
much to help improve them. “The first was developed in the 1940s,” Dhar
explained, “and it’s still the mainstay of hearing evaluation.” The test only
measures the lower part of a person’s hearing range—where the early signs
of hearing loss aren’t even detectable.
To help put this right, Dhar and associate professor of communication
sciences and disorders Jonathan Siegel (above, left) have teamed up to build
a better hearing test. The two are developing a system capable of measuring the entire 20,000-hertz human hearing range—a feat that, until now,
has been elusive. (“Jon’s been trying to solve this for a long time,” said
Dhar, “and I think we’re very close.”) The research team is focusing on
practical fixes, such as measuring patients’ otoacoustic emissions to help
detect the earliest hearing changes. Together they’ve created a clinical tool
that is sure to blow today’s hearing tests out of the water. Already used by
clinicians at the School of Communication’s Audiology Clinic and at the
University of Illinois at Chicago, the machine will become more widely
available in the next year or two. For the hearing impaired—and the
healthcare industry at large—that’s welcome music to the ears. X
presentation of it, is so complex. There’s a
saying: If you’ve met one child with autism,
you’ve met one child with autism.”
Undaunted by the disorder’s complicated nature, Losh and her colleagues in the
Neurodevelopmental Disabilities Lab have
set out to find its causes. They are currently
conducting two sets of studies—one focusing
on language and social functioning, the other
on genetic factors, particularly a gene linked
to a condition called Fragile X.
Ultimately Losh hopes her findings will
help unlock what causes the disorder—a discovery that could lead to better interventions
for the people who have it. X
13
Treating swallowing disorder
Jerilyn Logemann,
the Ralph and
Jean Sundin
Professor in
Communication
Sciences and
Disorders, has a
knack for doing
things in a big
way. As a speech
pathologist she’s treated more than 20,000
patients. As one of the nation’s leading
swallowing-disorder specialists, she’s looked
at the role that many diseases—Parkinson’s,
Alzheimer’s, head and neck cancer, stroke—
play in dysphagia (swallowing difficulty).
And she’s conducted almost 200 studies as
the director of the Swallow Physiology Lab.
Logemann also pioneered the modified barium swallow test, a less stressful
alternative to an x-ray study that until the
mid-1970s was the only available option for
patients with swallowing problems. And
while the new test had quaint roots (“I took
a sugar cookie recipe and put in some barium powder in place of the flour,” she said),
it’s now the standard diagnostic tool in
many clinical environments.
Today Logemann is studying aging and
how it affects the swallowing function of
people 50 and above. In her clinical work she
treats patients whose neck and throat cancer
often requires severe treatment. Logemann
says these patients need to exercise their
throat and tongue muscles before radiation
because it can damage the tissue, making
swallowing difficult. In extreme cases, 10
years after surgery some patients find themselves unable to eat. “But when we stress
the importance of the exercise program,”
she said, “we find that half or fewer of our
patients say they’re willing to participate.”
This has inspired her current focus: “How do
we provide patients with the best counseling
and information to help them make the best
possible healthcare decisions?” X
14
Mobilizing help for depression
A therapist who never leaves your side? Thanks to the work of associate
professor of communication studies Darren Gergle (left) and his colleague
David Mohr, the notion isn’t nearly as far-fetched as it might sound. Gergle
and Mohr, director of the Center for Behavioral
Intervention Technologies at the Feinberg
School of Medicine, have teamed up to create
a phone app that measures the mood of people
who are clinically depressed.
Mobilyze! uses data from sensors already
embedded in your phone—such as GPS,
Bluetooth, WiFi, and accelerometers—to help
identify your location, activity level, and social
context. Suddenly your smartphone isn’t just
smart. It’s sensitive, too—attuned enough to monitor your mood if you’re
struggling with depression and even to send you a text message encouraging you to get up, out, and into the company of a friend.
Gergle and his colleagues in the School of Communication’s
CollabLab first developed the technology as a general way to measure
behavior through sensor data from smartphones and laptops. “Then I
talked to David Mohr,” he said, “about how this system could be used
to provide a richer understanding of behavior and activity as they relate
to people with severe depression.”
The app is still being tested, but a small preliminary trial has shown
that after two months, patients who initially scored high on a test for major
depression no longer met the criteria. Journalists have taken to calling it a
pocket-sized therapist. Diminutive though it may be, however, its potential
is outsized. “The technology is flexible,” Gergle explained, “so it could be
used in similar ways to support things like exercise and nutrition.” X
Singing the praises
of musical training
A lot of male rock stars, when asked why
they took up music, say they did it to get
girls. But it turns out that learning how
to play an instrument—and practicing it
consistently—got them much more than
that. In groundbreaking research over the
past decade, Nina Kraus and her colleagues
in the Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory
have found that people who play a musical
instrument have brains that are better wired
for sound. This advantage affects language
skills, such as listening to speech in noise
and reading, and can even offset communication difficulties that often accompany aging.
These findings are sure to influence the study
of dyslexia, autism, aging, and other conditions, and many in the medical world have
already taken notice.
In two inspiring new educational initiatives, music educators in Chicago’s public
schools and the LA-based nonprofit Harmony
Project are providing kids with free instruments and lessons while Kraus and her team
study their brains. What’s different about
these tandem studies is not just the test
subjects (most of whom have no prior musical training) but also the setting. “It’s ‘real
world,’ school-based instruction that represents a new direction for research on the
impact of musical experience on the nervous
system,” she said.
The Hugh Knowles Chair in audiology
and professor of communication sciences,
neurobiology, physiology, and otolaryngology, Kraus recently discussed her research
in a webinar for the Federal Interagency
Task Force on the Arts and Human Development. And while much of the work is still
ongoing, she’s certain the data will yield
further insights on the effects of musical
experience on brain development. “Our early
findings,” she said, “have been extremely
encouraging.” X
Studying persuasion and health decisions
How do you convince a person to stop smoking? Wear sunscreen? Vaccinate a child against hepatitis B? If these questions had easy answers, the
world would be a much better place. Daniel O’Keefe, the Owen L. Coon Professor of Argumentation and Debate, studies persuasion: “I’m interested in how
and why persuasive messages have the effects they do.” And though he looks
at appeals of all sorts, his research often focuses on health-related messages.
O’Keefe recently zeroed in on attempts to promote vaccination. He
set out to learn which sorts of appeals were more convincing: gain-framed
(vaccinating yourself against the human papillomavirus will greatly
reduce your risk of getting HPV-related cervical cancer) or loss-framed
(4,000 US women die of cervical cancer each year; you could be one of
them if you don’t vaccinate yourself against
the human papillomavirus).
It’s widely perceived that gain-framed
appeals are more persuasive in promoting
disease-prevention behavior, said O’Keefe.
“But what we found was surprising. There
was no difference at all. The messages were
equally effective. Our results did contain a
hint, though, that parents might be more
persuaded to vaccinate their children by
loss-framed appeals.” Subtle though these
distinctions may be, they have huge implications for message makers, Mad Men, and
the research community at large—which in
the world of health communication could
be a matter of life and death. X
15
Approaching hearing-device development from every angle
If you don’t wear one yourself, chances
are you know someone who does.
Hearing aids and cochlear implants
(surgically implanted devices playfully referred to as bionic ears) are a
lifeline for millions of people across
the planet. At the Roxelyn and Richard
Pepper Department of Communication
Sciences and Disorders, three lab directors are hard at work on research to
make these devices even better.
Professor Pamela Souza (below) runs
the School of Communication’s Hearing
Aid Laboratory. While she’s very well
versed in the mechanics of hearing aids
themselves,
that’s not
where she’s
focusing
her attention these
days. In a
break from
traditional
research
approaches, she is working with a cognitive psychologist to measure not just
how individual listeners hear but also
how they think. “When you are trying
to listen to someone in a noisy restaurant,” she said, “that’s a cognitive process. And the better we can understand
all aspects of a person’s hearing ability
—cognition, auditory responses—the
better we can customize hearing-aid
technology to suit them. So that’s really
what we’re after right now. And what
we’re finding is that it’s not just about
the ear. It’s about the brain, too.”
Assistant professor Jason Tait Sanchez
—see photo with student Suzie Labelle
(C16) on page 3—has set his sights on
the brain, as well. But the brains he’s
looking at are much, much smaller:
they belong to chicken embryos. A
quick chat with the director of the
Central Auditory Physiology Lab will
quickly convince you that “birdbrain”
is a misnomer. “Birds are precocious
when it comes to hearing,” he said.
“Their sensitivity to sound is really
quite good.” By studying the embryos’
neural activity (which closely mirrors
our own), Sanchez hopes to unlock
mysteries about how the auditory brainstem develops—findings that could
Rethinking social media for seniors
You can think of Anne Marie
Piper as a cross between an
inventor and the daughter
you’d really want as you head
into your golden years. The
assistant professor of communication studies creates
computer-based games and
applications to help people
16
with communication-related
disabilities, and while her
work benefits people of all
ages, lately she’s spent much
of her time thinking about
the Greatest Generation.
Take Ethel, a 105-yearold great-great-grandmother
who has become increasingly
withdrawn. To help improve
Ethel’s interaction with her
nearby family and care staff,
Piper designed an audioenhanced interactive photo
album. By using customdeveloped Tap & Play software on a digital pen, Ethel
was able to press the stylus
ultimately affect how hearing devices are
designed. “Once we better understand how
the auditory system codes sounds,” he said,
“we can establish a template for engineering
hearing devices that would mimic the speed
and precision of what happens biologically.”
Assistant professor Tina Grieco-Calub (left)
studies very young children, particularly
those who use cochlear implants. As the
director of the Hearing and Language Lab,
Grieco-Calub has studied how cochlear
implants influence language use and the
potential benefits of using two implants
versus one. She is now looking further back
to the period before children receive their
implants. “I’ve been working on a project
with other Northwestern researchers and
the Cochlear Implant Program at Lurie
Children’s Hospital,” she said. “We’re looking at pre-implant factors that may relate to
later language outcomes and influence how
well children will do once they receive an
implant.” Like Souza’s work, the focus at this
point is more on the person than the prescription. “Being able to identify children’s
cognitive and language skills at the time of
implantation and the type of intervention
that will best promote language acquisition
in an individual child,” said Grieco-Calub,
“that’s the holy grail.” X
tip against paper photos
and suddenly hear her family
members’ voices describing
each scene. For a centenarian who’d never used a
computer or a cellphone, the
technology was a revelation.
“Her family members told
me that having the album
Making social media more present
“People are getting so many emails these days,” said assistant professor of
communication studies Jeremy Birnholtz, “that a common way of coping is
just to ignore them.” This leads to all kinds of problems—such as the one
that inspired Birnholtz’s current research. In
2004 he was living in Geneva, Switzerland,
studying the massive collaborations among
scientists at the CERN particle physics laboratory. “There would be three thousand
coauthors working on the same paper,” he
said, and often the email between them would
get lost down the proverbial rabbit hole.
“Many of them told me they found it necessary to get on a plane and fly thousands of
miles to Geneva, just to get answers to questions they had. This got me
thinking about the idea of being there, how it commands attention in a
way that online interaction can’t.”
Today Birnholtz runs the Social Media Lab and looks at how these
same benefits of face-to-face interaction can be incorporated or mimicked
in digital communication. In one of his studies he interviewed seniors
with chronic pain. “Many of them talked about days when they had things
scheduled but just didn’t feel up to doing them,” said Birnholtz. “They
wanted to be able to convey this to family and caregivers but also maintain
their sense of independence.”
So Birnholtz and his colleagues developed Open Messenger, a software
program that allows users in remote locations to keep tabs on each other
using eye-tracking technology. The lab is exploring new phone and tablet
interfaces that let a caller check a person’s availability before placing a
call. “We want to give seniors face-saving ways of communicating,” said
Birnholtz, “easy ways for them to say, ‘Not now, please. I’m OK, but this is
not the best time for me to talk.’” X
helped spark conversation
and memories from the past,”
said Piper.
Before coming to Northwestern, Piper was a userexperience researcher at
Microsoft and Leapfrog, and
she’s brought a lot of what
she learned there to her
work as director of the
Inclusive Technology
Lab. Her latest endeavor?
Engaging older adults in
social media. “Many of them
willfully abstain from things
like Facebook and Twitter
for intuitive reasons, like
privacy,” said Piper. “But the
older adults we study really
want to connect with the
younger members of their
family. So our goal is to hone
in on today’s interfaces but
rethink them in a way that
makes them comfortable and
relevant for people in their
80s or 90s.” X
17
Faculty focus
Illinois at Chicago received
an American Hearing Research
Foundation grant to study
the effects of their new test to
discern very-early-stage hearing
loss in patients exposed to
certain chemotherapy drugs
(see page 13).
Aphasia Treatment Program”
at the American SpeechLanguage-Hearing Association
convention in Chicago. Wilkins
and Hadziselimovic supervise
clinical services at the School
of Communication’s Speech,
Language, and Learning Clinic.
Scott Curtis (PhD, University of
Iowa) gave the lecture “Rough
and Smooth: The Rhetoric of
Animated Images in Scientific
and Educational Film” at
Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt,
Germany, this spring. He was
this year’s Fulbright-Innsbruck
Visiting Professor in the
Humanities and Social Sciences
at the University of Innsbruck.
Happy Camp, a debut screenplay by Zayd Dohrn (MFA, New
York University), was sold
to Bedlam Productions this
spring. The noir thriller will be
directed by Peter Webber (Girl
with a Pearl Earring, Hannibal
Rising). Dohrn’s play Muckrakers
premiered at Massachusetts’s
Barrington Stage in June.
Kyle Henry (MFA, University of
Sumitrajit Dhar (PhD, Purdue
Paul Edwards (PhD, University
University), Jonathan Siegel
(PhD, Washington University),
and their colleague David
Klodd of the University of
of Texas at Austin) won a 2013
non-Equity Jeff Award for his
adaptation of Peyton Place, which
ran at Chicago’s City Lit Theater
earlier this year.
Clayton Brown (MFA, Northwest-
ern University) and Monica
Long Ross directed The Believers,
a documentary about the discovery of cold fusion. The film
was screened at Northwestern’s
Block Museum in May.
Pablo Boczkowski (PhD, Cornell
University) and doctoral student
Eugenia Mitchelstein have coauthored The News Gap: When the
Information Preferences of the Media
and the Public Diverge (MIT Press).
Thomas Bradshaw (MFA, Brooklyn
College) was commissioned to
write a new work for Blues for
Smoke, an interdisciplinary exhibition at New York’s Whitney
Museum last spring that
explored the enduring legacy
of the blues in contemporary
music and performance.
Laura Schellhardt (MFA, Brown University), a lecturer in the Department of
Theatre and a Northwestern alumna, received a top Northwestern teaching honor this spring. Schellhardt (above, second from right) was named
a Charles Deering McCormick University Distinguished Lecturer in a ceremony with (from left) Northwestern President Morton Schapiro, Charles
Deering McCormick family representative Kathleen T. McCormick, and
Provost Daniel Linzer. The award recognizes individual faculty members
who have “consistently demonstrated outstanding performance in classroom teaching or who have developed significant innovations that have
also influenced the methods and teaching effectiveness of other faculty.”
18
Henry Godinez (MFA, University
of Wisconsin–Milwaukee) was
named a 2013 University of
Wisconsin–Milwaukee Alumni
Fellow. The award is a lifelong
designation recognizing outstanding alumni. Godinez is a
resident artistic associate at
Chicago’s Goodman Theatre,
where he directs the Latino
Theatre Festival.
Belma Hadziselimovic (MS,
Columbia University) and
Aaron Wilkins (BA, Elmhurst
College) presented “Outcome
Measures for an Intensive
Texas at Austin) edited the PBS
documentary Before You Know
It, which screened at New York
City’s Lincoln Center in June
as part of its “Art of the Real”
film series.
Nina Kraus (PhD, Northwestern
University) has joined forces
with the Harmony Project, an
award-winning research-based
nonprofit that targets at-risk
youth in underserved areas of
Los Angeles. Kraus and her colleagues in the Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory are doing
longitudinal studies on 80 of
the program’s school-aged children. They are also conducting
a sister study that measures the
neurobiological development
of 150 adolescents in Chicago
public schools. Earlier this year
Kraus received the Gene Cohen
Research Award in Creativity
and Aging from the American
Gerontological Society.
Jerilyn Logemann (PhD, Northwestern University) received
a Developmental Research
Grant Award from the National
Institutes of Health to study the
progression of feeding and swallowing disorders in Alzheimer’s
disease. She was also awarded
an honorary fellowship by
London’s Royal College of
Speech and Language Therapists
for her distinguished work in
speech and language therapy.
Mary Zimmerman (C82, GC85,
GC94), the Jaharis Family
Professor of Performance
Studies, adapted the new
stage musical The Jungle
Book from the Disney animated
film and the stories of Rudyard
Kipling for Chicago’s Goodman
Theatre this summer. The production featured lush costumes
by Mara Blumenfeld (C92), sets
by Daniel Ostling (GC96), and
new musical arrangements
by music director Doug Peck
(WCAS03). The cast included
Anjali Bhimani (C96) and (far
left) Govind Kuwmar (C08).
Molly Losh (PhD, University of
California, Berkeley) received
a 2012 Doctoral Student
Mentoring Award from the
American Speech-LanguageHearing Association.
Professor emeritus John McKnight
(BS, Northwestern University)
was awarded an honorary doctorate by Canada’s University
of Waterloo. He was recognized
for his research and outreach
related to marginalized populations, improving social service
delivery, and combating racism
and other forms of discrimination. McKnight is a founder of
Northwestern’s Institute for
Policy Research.
Janice Radway (PhD, Michigan
State University) gave the
Evanston Northwestern
Humanities Lecture at the city’s
public library in April. Her
lecture, “Debating the Meaning
of Girlhood in the 1990s: How
Girls Talked Back and What It
Means Now for Their Futures,”
explored the phenomenon of
self-published girl “zines” and
the state of girlhood at the very
end of the 20th century.
Book Award, the 2013 Outstanding Publication Award
from the Congress on Research
in Dance, and the Special
Citation for the 2012 de la
Bueno Torre Prize in Dance
Studies from the Society of
Dance History Scholars.
An article by Aaron Shaw
(PhD, University of California,
Berkeley) and Yochal Benkler
that was published last year
in American Behavioral Scientist
won the 2013 Best Published
Article Award from the Information Technology and Politics
Section of the American Political
Science Association.
Eric Patrick (MFA, California
Institute of the Arts) was
awarded a School of Communication Innovations Grant
and a University Research
Grants Committee grant.
Gayla Poling (PhD, Ohio State
University) received a Clinical
Research Grant from the
American Speech-LanguageHearing Foundation.
Mimi White (PhD, University of
Iowa) wrote the article “Gender
Territories: House Hunting
on American Real Estate TV,”
published in Television and New
Media, and the chapter “Barry
Chappell’s Fine Art Showcase:
Apparitional TV, Aesthetic
Value, and the Art Market” for
the book After the Break: Television
Theory Today (Amsterdam
University Press, 2013).
Professor emerita Laura Wilber
(PhD, Northwestern University)
received a Distinguished
Achievement Award from the
American Academy of Audiology.
Ramón Rivera-Servera (PhD,
University of Texas at Austin)
won the 2013 Lambda Literary
Award in the category of LGBT
studies for Performing Queer
Latinidad: Dance, Sexuality,
Politics. The book also won
the Latin American Studies
Association’s Latino/a Studies
David Tolchinsky (MFA, University of Southern California)
was awarded a School of
Communication Innovations
Grant. His “Where’s the Rest
of Me?,” a reflective humor
piece about Spalding Gray,
was published in Paraphilia
magazine.
Anne Sobel (MFA, Northwestern
University) was awarded a Doha
Film Institute grant to produce
her movie Schway Schway, Shoo
Shoo. The grant covers a professional film crew and equipment.
19
also president of BLL Consulting and Pharm
New faculty
I.R., firms that specialize in problems involving health, communication, and technology.
TENURED FACULTY
Lambert received his PhD from the UniverBruce Lambert is a
sity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
professor in the
Department of
Communication
Studies and director of Northwestern’s Center for
Communication
and Health. His research focuses on health
communication, drug name confusion,
patient and medication safety, health literacy, health information technology, prescribing behavior, pharmacoepidemiology,
pharmaceutical promotion, medical liability
reform, and health outcomes associated
with provider-patient communication. He
is currently the principal investigator for
a five-year center grant, funded by the US
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality,
to study techniques for optimizing medication safety. A faculty member at the University of Illinois at Chicago for 22 years,
Lambert is a founding member of the UIC
Institute for Patient Safety Excellence. He is
TENURE-TRACK FACULTY
Megan Roberts is an
assistant professor
in the Roxelyn and
Richard Pepper
Department of
Communication
Sciences and Disorders. Her work
focuses on family-centered early communication interventions for young children
with language delays. This clinically based
line of research examines variations of
parent-implemented communication interventions tailored specifically for different
populations of children with language
delays. Her research has been funded by the
National Institute on Deafness and Other
Communication Disorders and the Institute
of Education Sciences. Roberts earned her
PhD from Vanderbilt University.
Clinic, lab, and research center cohost aphasia discussion
In July the Northwestern University Speech, Language, and
faculty members Cynthia Thompson, the Ralph and Jean
Learning (SLL) Clinic, the Aphasia and Neurolinguistics Research
Sundin Professor of Communication Sciences and a leading
Laboratory, and the Center for the Neurobiology of Language
aphasia researcher, and Belma Hadziselimovic, clinician and
Recovery—all housed in the School of Communication—hosted
lecturer in communication sciences and disorders, along with
a screening of the documentary After Words. The film explores
an SLL Clinic client living with aphasia. Moderator for the panel
the lives of people with aphasia, a communication disorder that
was Steve Bynum, a senior producer at Chicago public radio
commonly results from stroke or other neurologic events.
station WBEZ.
Held at the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, the event
20
“An important component of the clinic’s mission is to
welcomed people living with aphasia and their family members
serve individuals with communication and related disorders
as well as students, practicing speech-language pathologists,
through treatment, education, and translational research,” said
and interested community members. After the screening a
Thompson. “This collaboration between the SLL Clinic and
panel discussion shared research, clinical strategies, and real-life
the Aphasia and Neurolinguistics Research Laboratory is an
experiences of people living with aphasia. The panel included
outstanding example of translating that mission into practice.”
LECTURERS AND VISITING FACULTY
Melika Bass is a lec-
turer in the Department of Radio/
Television/Film.
A filmmaker and
installation artist,
she was a recent
Pick-Laudati Artist
Gardens Theatre, ETA Creative Arts, the
Goodman Theatre, and other Chicago-area
stages. The many productions he has
directed include the Joseph Jefferson Award–
winning 12 Angry Men for Chicago’s Raven
Theatre and the Black Theatre Alliance
Eszter Hargittai, promoted
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
to full professor of communication studies
Roxane HeinzeBradshaw is a
has received an Artadia Award, an Illinois
visiting assistant
Arts Council Media Arts Fellowship, the
professor in the
Ann Arbor Film Festival’s Kodak/Filmcraft
Department of
Imaging Award, and an Athens International
Theatre. Formerly
Film Festival Experimental Film Prize. She
the managing
earned her MFA from the School of the Art
editor at Samuel
French, the largest and oldest English-
Aaron Todd Douglas
Department of
Theatre. A founding
ensemble member
of Chicago’s Congo
Square Theatre
Company, he is
a stage actor and director with credits at
to full professor of communication sciences and
disorders
Douglas earned his MFA from the University
Institute for the Humanities. Bass’s work
is a lecturer in the
Sumitrajit Dhar, promoted
Award winners Pill Hill and Talented Tenth.
in Residence at Northwestern’s Alice Kaplan
Institute of Chicago.
PROMOTION
AND TENURE
language dramatic literature resource, she
edited its two-volume anthology Exceptional
Monologues for Men and Women, issued in
Viorica Marian, promoted
disorders
Pamela Souza, promoted
disorders
Ana Kuzmanic, promoted
to associate professor of
theatre
2010 and 2011. Heinze-Bradshaw has served
Jacob Smith, promoted
as dramaturg for many productions in
to associate professor of
radio/television/film
New York and Chicago. She earned her
PhD in theatre from the City University
of New York and her MFA in dramaturgy
and theatre criticism from Brooklyn College.
Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Victory
Molly Losh, associate professor of communication
sciences and disorders,
granted tenure
Book on organizational change wins prize
Communication studies professor Paul
Leonardi also teaches in Northwestern’s Kellogg School of
Leonardi has received the National
Management and is the Pentair–D. Eugene and Bonnie L.
Communication Association’s Diamond
Nugent Associate Professor in Manufacturing in the McCormick
Anniversary Book Award. Established in
School of Engineering and Applied Science.
1994, the award recognizes
Previous NCA Diamond Anniversary Book Award winners
the most outstanding schol-
include School of Communication professors
arly book published by an
Angela Ray for The Lyceum and Public Culture in
NCA member during the
previous two years. Leonardi was honored for Car
Crashes without Cars: Lessons about Simulation
the Nineteenth-Century United States (Michigan
State University Press, 2005) and Robert Hariman
(with coauthor John Louis Lucaites) for No Caption
Technology and Organizational Change from
Needed: Iconic Photographs, Public Culture,
Automotive Design (MIT Press, 2012), which
and Liberal Democracy (University of Chicago
examines why workplace innovation is often
Press, 2007).
stifled by inside-the-box thinking.
21
Alumni achievements
Class notes are selected from alumni
submissions to Northwestern
magazine at www.northwestern
.edu/magazine, stories of alumni
featured in the media as identified
by the University’s Office of
Alumni Relations and Development, and updates sent to
Dialogue by mail or by email
at [email protected].
1960s
Sherry Lansing (C66, H95) received
the 2013 Lifetime Achievement
Award at the 27th annual Israel
Film Festival in Beverly Hills
in May.
1970s
Jeff Ravitz (C72) designed the
lighting for the PBS special
Il Volo, filmed before a live
audience at the Jackie Gleason
Theatre in Miami. He also lit the
fourth annual All Star Comedy
Jam, hosted by Shaquille O’Neal.
Bill Melamed (C79) was promoted
to chief marketing and development officer for Hubbard Street
Dance Chicago in July.
1980s
Eric Fingerhut (C81) was appointed
president and CEO of Hillel, the
international foundation for
campus Jewish life.
Marg Helgenberger (C82) stars in
the new CBS drama Intelligence.
Helgenberger returns to the network after a 12-season run on
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.
Kat Falls (GC83) is the author
of Inhuman, a young adult
dystopian-romance novel
issued by Scholastic Press
in September.
Debby Belt (C85, GJ87), a real
estate agent based in Newton,
Massachusetts, is now affiliated
with Hammond Residential
Real Estate.
1990s
Carolyn Barth (C90) was promoted
to director of media relations
at the American College of
Prosthodontists in April.
Annie Dye (C87) is the head
of the English department
at Saint George’s School in
Bogotá, Colombia.
Daniel G. Guyette (C87) became
the dean of Western Michigan
University’s College of Fine
Arts in July.
Cowboy Christmas, a featurelength documentary by H. D.
Motyl (GC90) about professional
rodeo cowboys in the western
United States, received its
world premiere at Spain’s
Madrid International Film
Festival in July.
Stephanie Rogers (C89) is the
vocalist and leader of the
Stephanie Rogers Band and the
owner of Hip Chick Records.
Andrew Ross (C90), formerly
the chief operating officer for
Illinois governor Pat Quinn,
was appointed managing
Screenwriter John Logan (C83),
a three-time Oscar nominee,
is developing Penny Dreadful,
an eight-episode drama for
Showtime that will weave
iconic monsters like Dracula
and Frankenstein into its storyline. As the project’s writer and
executive producer, he will collaborate with Academy Award
winner Sam Mendes and producer Pippa Harris.
Screenwriter and filmmaker Jeff
Baron (C74), whose credits include
The Tracey Ullman Show and
Sisters, has written his first book,
I Represent Sean Rosen, published
in March by HarperCollins.
The Wild Roses, a novel by Robert
Elisberg (C74), was published by
Third Road Press this summer.
Hudson Fair (C76, GC79), a
Grammy Award–winning music
engineer and producer, was
named Tube and Tape Supremo
by Fluffy Package Records and
Tapes Foundation in February.
His company, Atelier HudSonic,
is headquartered in Chicago.
22
Paul McComas (GC84) premiered
his indie film Time Trek at
Milwaukee’s Shank Hall in
August as part of a fundraiser
for the Humane Society. His
comedic horror novella Fit
for a Frankenstein (Walkabout
Publishing) was issued in
March.
Alumni Jed Feder (C11) and Matt Deitchman (C12), performing as Late for Lunch,
were part of this spring’s Johnny Mercer Foundation Songwriters Project, a
weeklong songwriting workshop hosted by the School of Communication’s
American Music Theatre Project. This year’s master teachers included Tonynominated composer-lyricist Craig Carnelia, three-time Grammy-winning singersongwriter Lari White, and award-winning songwriter Jon Lind, senior vice
president of artists and repertoire at Hollywood Records.
director at Clayco, a Chicagobased design-build and construction firm.
Traci Paige Johnson (C91),
cocreator of the children’s
television show Blue’s Clues,
founded the interactive
children’s media company
Yummico, where she oversees
creative vision and curriculum.
Lisa J. Matyas (C92, L99) became
an associate in the corporate
group at Chicago’s Goodsmith
Gregg & Unruh earlier this
year.
David Chalian (C95) became the
supervising producer for the
CNN television series Crossfire
in July.
The 2013 School of Communication Writers Panel, hosted by the Office of External Programs, Internships,
and Career Services, featured Hollywood TV veterans (from left) David Levine (C97), vice president of
original programming at HBO, whose current projects include Game of Thrones; Eric Charmelo (WCAS95),
who with Nicole Snyder (C97) is coexecutive producer of the CW series Supernatural; Melanie Marnich,
who has written for Big Love; and Angela Robinson, coexecutive producer for True Blood.
Seth Meyers (C96), head writer
for Saturday Night Live, will
become the host of NBC’s
Late Night in February.
Jason Akel (C96), cofounder
of the San Francisco–based
restaurant group New Food
Ventures, is launching Rival,
an interactive food event
where restaurant guests are
the honorary judges in a chefversus-chef cook-off. More
than 100 executive chefs have
signed on to participate.
Tom Arvetis (C96) is the founder
and producing managing
director for Adventure Stage
Chicago, which produces
theatre for children. He
directed ASC’s world-premiere
production of Augusta and
Noble, a play about a young
Latina girl in Chicago that was
based on stories collected from
the Northwestern University
Settlement House in the city’s
West Town neighborhood.
The Kite Runner, a play by
Matthew Spangler (C96) based
on Khaled Hosseini’s novel,
was produced by Theatre
Calgary, Edmonton’s Citadel
Theatre, Boston’s New Repertory Theatre, the Nottingham
Playhouse, the Brighton Festival, and the Liverpool Playhouse during the 2012–13
season. His Tortilla Curtain,
adapted from the T. C. Boyle
novel and produced by the San
Diego Repertory Theatre, was
a finalist for the San Diego
Theatre Critics’ Circle Award
for outstanding new play.
Deanna Kimberly Burrell (C98),
an author and marketing
specialist at Chicago’s WVONAM, gave the talk “Building
Your Brand” in March at the
McCormick Tribune Center
Forum.
Kim Heiting (C98), the chief
marketing and communications director at NW Natural,
was appointed to the board
of directors at LifeWorks
Northwest, a nonprofit mental
health organization.
Robert Kreamer (C99), the
president and CEO of Clean
Power Finance, is vice chair
of the Solar Energy Industries
Association and serves on
the executive committee of
its board of directors.
leadership in closing the
achievement gap.” Last year
Gary Comer College Prep’s first
senior class graduated with 100
percent acceptance at four-year
universities. The Ryan Award
includes a $25,000 honorarium
and the opportunity to guest
lecture at the Kellogg School of
Management. In 2014 Troupis
will become the chief talent
officer for the Noble Network
of Charter Schools.
Tim Newby (GC04) was named
the CEO of BrandWizard,
the digital arm of Interbrand,
in April.
2000s
Tamara Roberts (GC03, GC09), an
Mamie Gummer (C05) appeared in
assistant professor of ethnomusicology and performance
studies at the University of
California, Berkeley, coedited
Yellow Power, Yellow Soul: The
Radical Art of Fred Ho, published in May by the University
of Illinois Press.
the feature film The Lifeguard,
released this summer. She was
also seen in recent episodes of
The Good Wife and The Big C.
James Troupis (C03), the princi-
pal of Chicago’s Gary Comer
College Prep, received the Ryan
Award from the Patrick G. and
Shirley W. Ryan Foundation
and the Accelerate Institute
in recognition of his “superior
Acts of Conspicuous Compassion:
Performance Culture and
American Charity Practices,
a book by Sheila Moeschen
(GC05), was published by the
University of Michigan Press
in June.
Erika Schmidt (C05) won the
Chicago Tribune’s 2013 Nelson
Algren Award for Short Fiction
for her “Story about a Family.”
23
Maggie Wartik (C05), a commu-
nications and community
manager with the Chicago
Tribune Media Group, was
included in Editor & Publisher’s
2013 “25 under 35,” a list
of young news-industry professionals recognized for
commitment to their craft.
Megan Sieberg (C07), the culinary arts program manager at
Chicago’s Center on Halsted,
was one of this year’s Windy
City Times “30 under 30,” which
honors the best in LGBTQIA
activism, business, culture, and
nonprofit work.
The Opportunist, a short film
written and directed by David
Lassiter (C08) and produced by
Alberto Roldan (C10) and Cate
Smierciak (C08), was screened
at the Cannes Film Festival
in May. It was one of only 10
films selected—and the only
American submission—for the
festival’s Short Film Corner
competition. Also contributing
to the film were director of
photography Mike Fuchs (C08),
editor Chris Amos (C10), gaffer
Travis LaBella (C11), colorist
Tyler Roth (C08), best boy electric
Stephen Ling (C12), and featured
actress Katy Yoder (C09).
The Burden of Not Having a
Tail, a play by Carrie Barrett
(GC09), was premiered by the
Sideshow Theatre Company
at Chicago Dramatists this
summer.
Jane Hornickel (GC12) won the
Hugh Knowles Center Ann and
Paul Arenberg Student Travel
Award last year, in addition to
receiving two Northwestern
research grants.
Julia Beck (C09) was named
director of academic programs
at Chicago’s Snow City Arts
in May.
Fat, a play by Ethan Kass (C12),
was given a staged reading by
Chicago’s American Theater
Company in February.
Lani Chevlin (C09) was promoted
The play 12th and Clairmount
by Jenni Lamb (GC12) was given
a staged reading by Houston’s
Wordsmyth Theatre Company
in April.
to a senior account executive
position at the healthcare
advertising agency Abelson
Taylor in June.
Lighting designer Sarah Hughey
(C09) won the Michael Maggio
Emerging Designer Award
at this year’s Merritt Awards
in Chicago. She was also
nominated for a Joseph
Jefferson Award.
In August the first annual
Gary Garrison Playwriting
Festival in Beaumont, Texas,
featured writing by Ashley
Richard (C09).
2010s
Forked, a film by Dan Ochwat
(GC12), was screened at the
Boston International Film
Festival in April.
You, Me, and Tuno, a play by Milta
Ortiz (GC12), was given a staged
reading at Chicago’s Black Box
Theatre in May.
Samira Anderson (GC13) received
the 2012 Doctoral Scholarship
Research Award from the Illinois
Academy of Audiology.
Costume designer Stephanie
Cluggish (GC13) won the Northwestern University Prize at
this year’s Merritt Awards
in Chicago.
Alvaro Saar Rios (GC10) is a
tenure-track theatre faculty
member at the University of
Wisconsin–Milwaukee.
Royer Bockus (C12) appeared as Bianca in The Taming of the
Shrew with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Bockus was
only one of the Wildcats at OSF this summer; theatre associate
professor Amanda Dehnert directed My Fair Lady, theatre professor Linda Roethke designed costumes for King Lear, and Miles
Fletcher (C11) appeared in both My Fair Lady and The Heart of
Robin Hood.
24
Andy Miara (GC11), the head
writer for the Onion News
Network, is cowriting the
sitcom pilot Schlub Life for
Comedy Central.
Victor Fanucchi (GC13) is a fulltime lecturer in the department
of screen arts and cultures at the
University of Michigan, where
he teaches screenwriting and
production courses.
Alexandra Parbery-Clark (GC13)
received the Midwinter Meeting
Audiology Award from the
Association for Research in
Otolaryngology earlier this year.
Health takes the stage
Bringing playfulness to tough talks
Eva Barr and Christopher Donahue in Still Alice
Portraying life—not death—with disease
In the affecting play Still Alice by Christine Mary Dunford
(C87, GC09), as produced by Chicago’s Lookingglass Theatre
Company, the protagonist—as played by Eva Barr (C88) —talks
to herself. But “herself” was played by
actress Mariann Mayberry. The public
face–private face interaction and the
homey set’s unexpected movements
were just two approaches used by
Dunford (left) and her Lookingglass
collaborators to turn Lisa Genova’s
Alzheimer’s disease novel into a
fraught night at the theatre.
Director of the new School of Theatre and Music at the
University of Illinois at Chicago, Dunford worked with
Lookingglass and the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s
Disease Center (CNADC) in Northwestern’s Feinberg School
of Medicine to cofound the Memory Ensemble, an improvisational theatre experience for people with memory loss. Why
improv? Because there are no lines to remember. Dunford
recalled hearing a lot about people “dying from” Alzheimer’s.
“But that didn’t match my experience working with these
people in the early stages of the disease and those who work
with them,” she said. “It was ‘living with’ I wanted to learn
about and write about.” The production ran this summer,
accompanied by free community discussions with experts
from CNADC and other Chicago organizations. The cast also
included Christopher Donahue (C85), Tracy Walsh (C89), and founding Lookingglass ensemble member David Kersnar (C88, GC08).
A group founded by School of Communication alumni treats
sex as a classroom subject. For Youth Inquiry (FYI) is a collective of artists, educators, and activists who seek to engage
young people on the topics of sexual health and sexual
violence. Using games, role playing, and other participatory
theatre techniques, FYI members prompt young people to ask
questions they wouldn’t normally feel comfortable bringing
up. “A sense of pretend is very liberating,” said founding member Jacob Watson (C11). “And the novelty of an outside group
coming in—this is not their biology teacher,” said Alison Lehner
(C08). “There’s a sense of playfulness. We want it to be fun, not
drudgery.” The group also includes Nikki Zaleski (C08), Shannon
Oliver-O’Neil (C11), Alyssa Ramos (C11), and Abby Zan Schwarz (C12).
Since its founding in 2011, FYI has grown and stretched in
new directions, such as eight-week residencies that send
members into schools as teaching artists and a collaboration
with the University of Chicago Medical Center. Members are
also becoming a creative-capacity resource for the community, training other advocates and educators to adopt methods
that will make their own classroom or social-justice youth
programs more effective. Recently Watson won an Individual
Artists Program grant from the City of Chicago’s Department
of Cultural Affairs and Special Events to facilitate a 10-week
FYI residency at Crown Community Academy. As the group
has matured, its members—already a few years out of college
—have started sharing the stage with younger adult performers to help keep in tune with today’s youth. What better way
to stay young?
25
NUEA updates
In memory
Bonita Humphrey Black (C30) on
August 4 at age 104 in Newton
Falls, Massachusetts
Janelle Kroll (C09)
and Morgan Karr (C09)
perform a duet at the
first Northwestern
College Bowl in April.
Coproduced by NUEA
East and the music
venue Brooklyn Bowl,
the standing-roomonly event featured a
lineup of up-and-coming
Northwestern talent.
Dorothy Davis Townsend (C38) on
March 10 at age 97 in Tampa,
Florida
Mary Henderson (C39) on June 22
at age 94 in Winnetka, Illinois
Hugh E. Reynolds (C41) on May 24
at age 97
NUEA West
Otis Monroe Walter (C42, GC43,
GC48) on June 13 at age 92 in
NUEA West held its first storytelling event, Love & …, featuring stories written and per-
Bellingham, Washington
formed by Jessica Cluess (C07), Marcus Folmar (C96), Lindsay Gelfand (C04), Naomi
Grossman (C97), Rati Gupta (WCAS06), Joe Hauler (J98), Robby Karol (C07), Kevin
Martin King (C80), Dava Krause (C01), Jenn Ludwigsen (C99), Puja Mohindra (J00),
and Matt Shore (WCAS08). The group also hosted a reading of faculty member David
Downs’s play Vag and the Boys, featuring the talents of Harry Lennix (C86), Kerry Bishe
(C06), Dillon Porter (C06), Marc Naggar (C06), Andrew Perez (C05), and Downs himself. NUEA’s Indie Film Spotlight Panel featured producer-actress Michelle Lang (C04) and
was moderated by April Wright (KSM92), an independent filmmaker who programs for
Sundance and AFI Fest. Other recent group events included a postproduction panel featuring sound editor Jackie Johnson (C86) and music supervisor Amanda Krieg (C07) and
Louise Pettit More (C44) on
February 7 at age 90 in
Wilmette, Illinois
Janet Berniece Severson (C47)
on July 12 in Santa Barbara,
California
Nancy Flynn (C49) on March 13
at age 86 in Denver, Colorado
Richard L. Gifford (C49) on May 11
at age 87 in Fort Worth, Texas
a short-film night with work by David Anderson (C00), Kristin Chirico (C08), Eric Choi
(C12), Michael Cotter (C98), Diane Carol Harder (GC09), Travis LaBella (C11) and Matt
Litwiller (C11), Dan Ochwat (GC12), Carol Rhyu (WCAS05), and Andy Wolf (C94).
In May, NUEA West teamed with the Kellogg Alumni Club of Los Angeles for a Speed
Networking and Elevator Pitch Workshop with Matthew Temple (KSM93). Another
event, “The Pitching Game,” offered pitching tips from writer-producer Harry Werksman
Marguerite Weber Calvert (C50)
on February 20 at age 84 in
Elkhart, Indiana
Richard Gram (C50) on August
26 at age 85 in Boynton Beach,
Florida
(WCAS87), producer Jennifer Stempel (C04), TV literary agent Jordan Cerf (C05), and
Andrew J. Plesa (C50) on June 21
professional pitching coach Heath Corson (WCAS95).
at age 87 in Sycamore, Illinois
The annual LA-NU Showcase in June featured pieces written, directed, and performed by
Laurance A. Woollard (C50) on
talented alumni, including Cat Alter (C12), Todd Aaron Brotze (McC97), Cara Danielle
July 4 at age 84 in Pensacola,
Florida
Brown (C09), Danielle Calvert (C11), Kale Clauson (C12), Dan Eder (J05), Erica Everage
(C10), Josh Fingerhut (C05), Lindsay Gelfand (C04), Naomi Grossman (C97), Katie Hall
Wendell J. Josal (GC51, GC61)
(C04), Briggs Hatton (C05), Leigh Hyser (GC10), Robby Karol (C07), Stephanie Kornick
on March 28 at age 91 in
Minneapolis, Minnesota
(GC10), Dava Krause (C01), Jackie Laine (C08), Steve Marvel (C84), Tucker May (C12),
Greg Porper (C12), Arnie Rotkin (L77), John Ruby (WCAS00), Sasha Salinger (C07),
Joel Sinensky (C09), Scott Speiser (C00), Jake Suffian (SESP96), Melli Vytlacil (C03),
Isabella Way (BSM01), and Tenere Williams (WCAS99).
An NU Authors event in July with the NU Club of LA featured published alumni authors
Francis T. McCann (GC51) on
May 20 at age 86 in San Jose,
California
Constance Staats (C51) on March 6
at age 84 in Burlington, Vermont
Damona Hoffman (C00), David Iserson (C00), Douglas Kmiec (WCAS73), Jennifer
Moss (BSM85), and Adam Schell (C92).
26
Lelia Craigo Wright (C51) on
April 8 at age 83 in Los Angeles,
California
Margery Geer (C52) on April 18 at
age 83 in Fort Wayne, Indiana
John B. Brannon Jr. (GC64) on
May 17 at age 82 in St. Louis,
Missouri
Robert Schneideman (C48,
GC49, GC56), professor
emeritus of theatre in the
Franz Langhammer (GC52, G56)
Salem, Oregon
Virginia Johnson (C64) on June 1 at
Alice Thompson Arwezon (C53)
Judith Wiedemer Parker (C64) on
and scholar whose roots
on August 31 at age 82 in
Fremont, Michigan
April 5 at age 71 in St. Augustine
Beach, Florida
were deeply embedded at
E. Patrick O’Brien (C53) on
Hubert V. Taylor (GC64) on June 2
at age 99 in Atlanta, Georgia
died on February 24 at age
age 87 in Dover, New Hampshire
86 in Evanston. A director
February 27 in Chicago, Illinois
Northwestern, he was well
loved by his students and
enjoyed a rich and varied
career. Schneideman was
Phyllis G. Silberman (C53) on July 2
at age 82 in Phoenix, Arizona
Rev. Richard B. McCafferty (GC65,
GC69) on March 18 at age 88 in
Los Gatos, California
Jeffrey Gulliford (C66) on
Silt, Colorado
Nevis E. Phillips (C54, GC59)
Chicago, Illinois
ing the Chicago office of the Shakespeare Globe Center and
wrote the book A Guide to Ezra Pound’s Cantos (VII). He men-
Edward M. Johnson (C54) on
Chicago, Illinois
instrumental in establish-
Alice Walling Snyder (GC66) on
April 10 at age 89 in Cleveland,
Ohio
John Schlimmer (C54) on June 6 at
tored countless young theatre artists, among them the actor
Robert Conrad, who came to Northwestern specifically to study
with him. A sometime magician, Schneideman encouraged his
students to look at the world in new ways, assigning new acting
students to visit the Lincoln Park Zoo and return to class with
their impressions. “He opened my mind to the thrilling option
of directing,” said one former student, “and my college trajec-
age 81 in Burlington, Wisconsin
Judith Wessing Towne (GC68)
Celia L. Bay (C56) on April 6 at
Greendale, Wisconsin
tory took a critical turn for the better.” Another added, “Every
time I walk into a directing room, I use what he taught me.”
age 78 in Tulsa, Oklahoma
Diana Goetz Bohl (GC69) on
Karen Black
at age 78 in Omaha, Nebraska
February 25 at age 69 in Erie,
Pennsylvania
Hollywood’s
Edward L. Tottle (GC57) on March 10
Harold M. Daniels (C70) on
at age 87 in Portland, Maine
Springfield, Ohio
Carol A. Combs (C56) on June 1
(C61), one of
most vivid character actresses,
died on August 8
Patricia Ireland Jamison (C58)
at age 74. She
on June 5 at age 76 in Kennett
Square, Pennsylvania
Marilynn Jeglum (GC73) on
John Palmer (C58) on August 3
Darren Scott Bender (C75) on
at age 77 in Washington, DC
April 30 at age 59 in Roseburg,
Oregon
John F. Franklin (C59) on May 19 at
Randall L. Rohn (C78, GJ79) on
Anna Klein Pleasonton (GC59) on
April 20 at age 59 in Statesville,
North Carolina
such movies
as Easy Rider,
Nashville, Family
Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean. For her performance in Five Easy
Pieces she received an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe
Award. Black entered Northwestern at age 15 and studied drama
April 13 at age 81 in Lima, Peru
March 11 at age 72 in Evanston,
Illinois
for her roles in
Plot, The Great Gatsby, Airport 1975, and Come Back to the Five and
age 76 in Westport, Connecticut
Kathleen Buck Bryant (C62) on
was best known
January 1 in Chicago, Illinois
Martin A. Powers (C85, GSESP89)
for two years before moving to New York, where she was seen
on June 23 at age 50 in Elgin,
Illinois
on and off Broadway. She went on to perform in nearly 200 tele-
Janet Ryan (C85) on August 23
Linda Gates Vandivier-Sabo (C62)
at age 68 in Wilmette, Illinois
Indianapolis, Indiana
Elspeth Kydd (GC92, GC96) on
Barbara L. Nichols (C63) on
April 9 at age 46 in Edinburgh,
Scotland
vision and film roles. “I like to wear sunglasses when I go out
and just observe people,” she once said. “Nobody understands
that except those who write, direct, and act. It’s just about
being enthralled by people: how they think, how they talk,
how they gesture, the relation between them all.”
April 12 at age 73 in Whittier,
California
27
Communicating gratitude
Supporting pioneers
in hearing science
Breakthrough work at the Knowles Hearing Center
mirrors its donors’ enterprising spirits.
To boldly go where no scientific researcher has gone before?
It may sound a little grandiose, but there’s no denying that
the work being done at the Hugh Knowles Center for Clinical
and Basic Science in Hearing and Its Disorders is pushing
new boundaries in audiology. It’s a fitting legacy, too, considering the center’s namesake had an innovative way of thinking that helped take his work to the moon and back.
Hugh S. Knowles was an acoustical engineer and inventor who founded Knowles Electronics, the nation’s leading
manufacturer of microphones and subminiature electronic
components, the hardware used in hearing devices. In 1988,
the year he died, the company made a gift to establish the
Hugh Knowles Center in his honor.
“Helping to further advancements in communication
was always very important to him,” said his widow, Nancy
Knowles (née Welch) (below, with Hugh Knowles in the
1980s), the chairman emerita of Knowles Electronics and
28
current president of the Knowles Foundation. A pioneer
in her own right, she went to work at Knowles Electronics in
the mid-1970s, starting in the marketing department. Through
hard work and persistence (“I learned and I grew,” she said, “I
paid attention”), she rose to become a vice president. She and
Knowles married in 1979. After his death, she assumed chairmanship of the company, a position she held until Knowles
Electronics was sold to Doughty Hanson & Company in 1999.
Today the company is still headquartered in Itasca, Illinois,
near O’Hare Airport—a location Hugh Knowles chose in 1954
to help speed international deliveries. “We were a global company before the word ‘global’ was used the way it is today,” said
Nancy Knowles. “We were doing business in Taiwan when it
was still called Formosa.”
She recalled when NASA called looking for communications equipment to help facilitate a trip to the moon. “They
had very complicated specifications for what they needed,”
she said. “We turned around and took one of our microphones
off the shelf, described it to them, and said, ‘Will this do?’
They said it was perfect. When you heard Neil Armstrong say,
‘That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,’
that was on our microphone.”
Today Nancy Knowles concentrates on her family’s foundation, which helps support the arts, education, health, international development, and social services, in addition to the
Knowles Hearing Center. Through its continued generosity,
big strides in audiology research are still being made: two
Knowles Center fellows are developing a new cutting-edge
hearing test (see page 13), and studies conducted in the Hearing Biology and Auditory Neuroscience Laboratories—to name
just two of the center’s busy labs—are helping unlock mysteries about the inner ear and the auditory brainstem. These are
big leaps on a broad landscape. “Our hope,” she said, “is to keep
pushing new frontiers.”
Braff visits as Abelson Artist
Actor-director-producer-writer Zach Braff (C97) returned to campus in May as the 2013 Hope Abelson Artist in Residence. The
Abelson program began in 1990 with a gift from the late Hope
Altman Abelson (CB30), who studied theatre at Northwestern
and became a Broadway producer.
Joined by faculty members Mary Poole and David Downs,
Braff (right) gave an acting workshop using scenes from his play
All New People. Best known for his film Garden State and his
long-running TV show Scrubs, Braff most recently appeared in
the Disney film Oz the Great and Powerful and will soon begin
Nixon Festival offers script credit
making the sequel to Garden State, for which he ran a successful
The Agnes Nixon Playwriting Festival had a new plot twist this
Kickstarter campaign.
year. Sponsored by Agnes Nixon (C44), who as the creator of
“You’re going to have reviewers say you’re a genius,” Braff
All My Children and One Life to Live is known as the first lady of
told students. “You’re going to have a reviewer say you should
daytime television, the festival celebrates the emerging writing
quit. And I just want to come back to students to say: you’re not
talent of School of Communication students. This year, in addition
going to be able to escape it. And now more than ever, you have
to seeing their work staged at the two-day festival on campus,
to go and be fearless and be yourself.”
the winning writers—Emily Acker (C13), Hilary Flynn (C14), and
Benjamin Sullivan-Knoff (C15)—were given the chance to collabo-
Health agenda at Lambert Conference
rate on a script for All My Children. The iconic soap opera recently
In April the School of Communication hosted the 2013 Lambert
Network, run by alumnus Jeff Kwatinetz (C87).
relaunched as a weekday web series on Prospect Park’s Online
Family Communication Conference (see page 4). “The Science
and Practice of Health Communication: Innovative Interfaces to
The Lamberts are highly involved members of the Northwestern
Schwimmer
speaks as
Wirtz Artist
community. Bill is a member of the Northwestern University
Actor-director David
Board of Trustees, while Sheila is a member of the School of
Schwimmer (C88) spoke
Communication National Advisory Council. They are also North-
on campus as the Virginia
western parents; their son, Phineas Lambert (C04), graduated
Wadsworth Wirtz Visiting
from the Department of Communication Studies.
Artist in May. This visiting-
Improve Health” was the seventh such event made possible by
the Lambert Family Foundation and Bill and Sheila Lambert.
This year’s conference was a two-day think tank exploring
artist program was estab-
the School of Communication’s potential to advance North-
lished through a gift by
western’s goals in global health and healthcare, especially
Wirtz’s grandson, Chicago
in graduate education and research. Communication faculty
Blackhawks chair and
members Ellen Wartella, Daniel O’Keefe, and Bruce Lambert
Wirtz Corporation president W. Rockwell “Rocky” Wirtz (C75),
(no relation) collaborated in bringing health and healthcare
who was a communication studies major at Northwestern.
experts from around the country to the Northwestern campus.
Schwimmer was in Chicago to direct Big Lake Big City for
Previous Lambert Family Communication Conferences have been
Lookingglass Theatre, where he is a founding ensemble member.
leveraged to cultivate opportunities for early-developmental-stage
Urging students to lead a creative life outside auditions, he said,
growth in areas of faculty interest, including issues of children’s
“The more you can control your creative life, the more you’ll be
health, media, and race; rhetoric and political theory; innovation
able to handle the brutal task of going out there and putting your-
in society; and team science.
self on the line every day, because you’re being fed in other ways.”
29
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Editors: Lori Rader-Day, Kingsley Day
Publications Writer: Lauren MacIntyre
Designer: Heather Cosgrove
Photo Credits: Justin Barbin (C11); Nicholson
Black for AP Images; Andrew Campbell;
Fox Searchlight Pictures; Jenny Graham
for Oregon Shakespeare Festival; Mary
Hanlon; Liz Lauren for Goodman Theatre;
Liz Lauren for Lookingglass Theatre; Rafi
Letzter (J15); Brian McConkey; Sally Ryan;
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Archives; Northwestern University in Qatar;
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Produced by University Relations.

Fall - School of Communication

Transcription

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